Paid Media Audience Strategy & Data Architecture Lead

Citi; Irving (TX); On-site; USD 114,720 - 172,080; Full time

Job summary

Citi in Irving, Texas is seeking an experienced Paid Media Audience Strategy & Data Architecture Lead to drive audience planning, activation, and data-enabled marketing across the paid media ecosystem. This role blends strategic audience development with data architecture to identify, prioritize, and activate high-value audiences that move business metrics.

You will collaborate with Marketing, Analytics, Data Science, and Technology teams to translate insights into scalable strategies, design

Qualifications

• 6-10 years in consumer marketing, advertising or media.
• 6-10 years in audience strategy, marketing analytics, customer data strategy, paid media, marketing technology, data architecture, or related disciplines.
• Experience developing audience strategies that support acquisition, engagement, retention, and growth objectives.
• Experience leveraging first-party data to build customer segments and activation strategies.
• Strong understanding of lifecycle marketing, audience planning, segmentation, and targeting methodologies.
• Experience working across MarTech and AdTech ecosystems, including audience activation and measurement.
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to transform customer insights into actionable business recommendations.
• Proficiency in SQL and experience working with large customer datasets.
• Strong communication and stakeholder management skills with experience presenting recommendations to business leaders.

Responsibilities

• Audience Strategy & Planning: Develop audience strategies that support customer acquisition, cross-sell, engagement, and retention objectives, define target audience frameworks using customer behavior, lifecycle stage, demographics, transactional data, and behavioral signals, determine the optimal timing, channel, and messaging approach for audience engagement, partner with business stakeholders to identify high-value audience opportunities aligned with strategic priorities and establish audience selection methodologies, segmentation standards, and measurement frameworks.
• Customer Insights & Audience Development: Leverage first-party data, analytics, and customer insights to identify actionable audience segments, evaluate audience performance and recommend optimizations based on campaign results and changing business objectives, collaborate with analytics and data science teams to develop propensity models, lookalike audiences, and predictive targeting approaches and translate complex customer data into clear audience recommendations for marketing teams.
• Data Architecture & Audience Enablement: Design and oversee data flows supporting audience creation, activation, and measurement across marketing and advertising platforms, partner with technology and data engineering teams to ensure audience data is integrated and distributed effectively, support identity resolution, customer matching, audience onboarding, and activation processes and ensure audience strategies can be operationalized and scaled across multiple activation platforms.
• MarTech & AdTech Strategy: Guide audience activation across digital marketing, paid media, CRM, and customer engagement platforms, partner with media teams to align audience strategies with channel capabilities and business objectives, evaluate and recommend tools, platforms, and processes that improve audience management and activation effectiveness and serve as a subject matter expert on audience strategy, data-driven targeting, and customer segmentation.
• Governance & Controls: Ensure audience creation and activation activities comply with established privacy, compliance, and data governance requirements, maintain documentation related to audience frameworks, segmentation methodologies, business rules, and activation processes and partner with risk, legal, and compliance teams to support governance reviews and audits.
• Cross-Functional Leadership: Lead collaboration across Marketing, Media, Analytics, Data Science, Technology, Product, and Compliance teams, influence strategic decision-making by providing data-driven audience recommendations and present audience strategies, insights, and performance results to senior stakeholders.
• Risk & Compliance: Appropriately assess risk when business decisions are made, demonstrating particular consideration for Citi’s reputation and safeguarding clients and assets.

Skills

Audience strategy

Marketing analytics

Customer data

Paid media

Data architecture

MarTech/AdTech

SQL

Stakeholder management

Education

Bachelor's degree

Master's degree preferred

Tools

LiveRamp

DSPs

CDPs

Identity platforms

Job description

We are seeking an experienced Paid Media Audience Strategy & Data Architecture Lead to drive audience planning, activation strategy, and data-enabled marketing initiatives across the paid media ecosystem. This role combines strategic audience development with data architecture expertise, helping the organization identify, prioritize, and activate audiences that drive business outcomes. The successful candidate will lead the development of audience frameworks that answer key strategic questions: Who should we target? When should we engage them? Where should we reach them? Why are they valuable?

Working closely with Marketing, Analytics, Data Science, Media, and Technology teams, this individual will translate customer insights and business goals into scalable audience strategies while ensuring data is appropriately integrated, governed, and activated across MarTech and AdTech platforms.

The ideal candidate is a strategic audience expert who understands how to combine customer insights, first-party data, and marketing technology to develop effective targeting strategies. They can define who to target, when to engage them, where to activate them, and why they matter, while partnering across teams to operationalize those strategies and drive measurable business outcomes.

Responsibilities:

• Audience Strategy & Planning: Develop audience strategies that support customer acquisition, cross-sell, engagement, and retention objectives, define target audience frameworks using customer behavior, lifecycle stage, demographics, transactional data, and behavioral signals, determine the optimal timing, channel, and messaging approach for audience engagement, partner with business stakeholders to identify high-value audience opportunities aligned with strategic priorities and establish audience selection methodologies, segmentation standards, and measurement frameworks.
• Customer Insights & Audience Development: Leverage first-party data, analytics, and customer insights to identify actionable audience segments, evaluate audience performance and recommend optimizations based on campaign results and changing business objectives, collaborate with analytics and data science teams to develop propensity models, lookalike audiences, and predictive targeting approaches and translate complex customer data into clear audience recommendations for marketing teams.
• Data Architecture & Audience Enablement: Design and oversee data flows supporting audience creation, activation, and measurement across marketing and advertising platforms, partner with technology and data engineering teams to ensure audience data is integrated and distributed effectively, support identity resolution, customer matching, audience onboarding, and activation processes and ensure audience strategies can be operationalized and scaled across multiple activation platforms.
• MarTech & AdTech Strategy: Guide audience activation across digital marketing, paid media, CRM, and customer engagement platforms, partner with media teams to align audience strategies with channel capabilities and business objectives, evaluate and recommend tools, platforms, and processes that improve audience management and activation effectiveness and serve as a subject matter expert on audience strategy, data-driven targeting, and customer segmentation.
• Governance & Controls: Ensure audience creation and activation activities comply with established privacy, compliance, and data governance requirements, maintain documentation related to audience frameworks, segmentation methodologies, business rules, and activation processes and partner with risk, legal, and compliance teams to support governance reviews and audits.
• Cross-Functional Leadership: Lead collaboration across Marketing, Media, Analytics, Data Science, Technology, Product, and Compliance teams, influence strategic decision-making by providing data-driven audience recommendations and present audience strategies, insights, and performance results to senior stakeholders.
• Appropriately assess risk when business decisions are made, demonstrating particular consideration for the firm’s reputation and safeguarding Citigroup, its clients and assets, by driving compliance with applicable laws, rules and regulations, adhering to Policy, applying sound ethical judgment regarding personal behavior, conduct and business practices, and escalating, managing and reporting control issues with transparency.

Qualifications:

• 6-10 years of experience in consumer marketing, advertising and/or media.
• 6-10 years of experience in audience strategy, marketing analytics, customer data strategy, paid media, marketing technology, data architecture, or related disciplines.
• Demonstrated experience developing audience strategies that support customer acquisition, engagement, retention, and growth objectives.
• Experience leveraging first-party data to build customer segments and activation strategies.
• Strong understanding of customer lifecycle marketing, audience planning, segmentation, and targeting methodologies.
• Experience working across MarTech and AdTech ecosystems, including audience activation and measurement.
• Strong analytical skills with the ability to transform customer insights into actionable business recommendations.
• Proficiency in SQL and experience working with large customer datasets.
• Strong communication and stakeholder management skills with experience presenting recommendations to business leaders.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience with LiveRamp or similar AdTech, identity resolution, clean room, customer data, or audience connectivity platforms.
• Experience with DSPs, CDPs, marketing cloud platforms, ad servers, and customer engagement technologies.
• Knowledge of customer identity, audience onboarding, attribution, and measurement methodologies.
• Experience in financial services, banking, or highly regulated industries.
• Bachelor's degree in Marketing, Analytics, Data Science, Information Systems, Business, or a related field.
• Experience with LiveRamp or similar audience and identity platforms is preferred but not required.

Education:

• Bachelor’s/University degree, Master’s degree preferred

This job description provides a high-level review of the types of work performed. Other job-related duties may be assigned as required.

------------------------------------------------------

Job Family Group:

Marketing

------------------------------------------------------

Job Family:

Advertising, Branding and Media

------------------------------------------------------

Time Type:

Full time

------------------------------------------------------

Primary Location:

Irving Texas United States

------------------------------------------------------

Primary Location Full Time Salary Range:

$114,720.00 - $172,080.00

In addition to salary, Citi’s offerings may also include, for eligible employees, discretionary and formulaic incentive and retention awards. Citi offers competitive employee benefits, including: medical, dental & vision coverage; 401(k); life, accident, and disability insurance; and wellness programs. Citi also offers paid time off packages, including planned time off (vacation), unplanned time off (sick leave), and paid holidays. For additional information regarding Citi employee benefits, please visit citibenefits.com. Available offerings may vary by jurisdiction, job level, and date of hire.

------------------------------------------------------

Most Relevant Skills

Please see the requirements listed above.

------------------------------------------------------

Other Relevant Skills

For complementary skills, please see above and/or contact the recruiter.

------------------------------------------------------

Anticipated Posting Close Date:

Aug 05, 2026

------------------------------------------------------

Automated Processing and AI

We use automated processing, including artificial intelligence, for our legitimate business interests (or our reasonable and appropriate business purposes) to identify and align the candidate's skills and abilities with a specific job opening. Additionally, if you so choose, or consent, we can match your skills and abilities to other suitable roles at Citi.

Importantly, all our hiring processes and decisions, including determining your suitability for a role, are conducted, checked, and decided by individuals. Our automated processing and AI do not involve relying on automatic or autonomous decision-making. Please refer to any Jurisdictional Considerations, with specific provisions for your country (where relevant) for further details.

Illinois residents – AI Notice and Right

------------------------------------------------------

Citi is an equal opportunity employer, and qualified candidates will receive consideration without regard to their race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, status as a protected veteran, or any other characteristic protected by law.

If you are a person with a disability and need a reasonable accommodation to use your search tools and/or apply for a career opportunity review Accessibility at Citi. View Citi’s EEO Policy Statement and the Know Your Rights poster.